In consideration of information security, it is more and more common to impart a user-verifying function to an electronic device, and more particularly to a portable device such as USB drive, smart phone, laptop computer, personal digital assistant (PDA), etc. Generally, the user-verifying function is performed by way of biological feature check, e.g. fingerprint check.
Please refer to FIG. 1A, which schematically shows the appearance of a smart phone, and FIG. 1B, which illustrates the flowchart of a conventional fingerprint-verifying process applied to the smart phone. After a user switches on the power of the smart phone 1 (Step 101), a booting process is executed (Step 102), and then a prompt window pops up on the display 10 (Step 103), instructing the user to perform fingerprint check through a scanner 11 disposed on the phone (Step 104). After acquiring an image data corresponding to the user's fingerprint, the smart phone 1 compares it with a previously stored image data (Step 105). If a comparable result is obtained, the smart phone enters a normal operation mode (Step 106) so as to allow the user to normally operate the phone. Thus the user may input commands via an optical mouse 12 as shown in FIG. 1A or the display 10 when it is a touch screen. On the contrary, if the acquired image data does not conform to the previously stored image data, the smart phone enters a locked mode so that the input means is disabled from normal command input (Step 107).
It is understood from the above that a fingerprint image data is required to be previously stored for subsequent comparison. The method for creating fingerprint image data in a smart phone is usually complicated and unfriendly to a user.
Please refer to FIG. 2 which illustrates a flowchart of a conventional method for creating a fingerprint image data in a smart phone. After the smart phone is powered on (Step 200), a series of user's inputs through the optical mouse or touch screen by way of an operational menu are required (Step 201) before a fingerprint-creating step can be started with a popup window instructing creation of fingerprint (Step 202). For data creation, the smart phone enters a training mode. Under the training mode, the user's fingerprint image data is captured by the fingerprint scanner 11 (Step 203), and the captured image data is stored in the phone (Step 204) as the reference for subsequent user verification described above.
As described above, fingerprint data needs to be created and stored in advance using a fingerprint scanner so that subsequent verification can be performed. The training mode for acquiring the reference fingerprint data complicates the operation of the phone and thus confuses or bothers the user. Consequently, the fingerprint-verifying function is likely to leave unused, and the information security becomes risky.